October 25, 1987

Children's Books

By CRESCENT DRAGONWAGON

NEW HOUSE
By Joyce Maynard.

hen Joyce Maynard writes for adults about childhood,
she's intelligent, thoughtful and heartfelt. But when,
in ''New House,'' she writes for children, her voice is
oddly flat, unchildlike. ''New House,'' Ms. Maynard's
second children's book, is reminiscent of 50's
grade-school reading texts: instructional, dull, with
dimensionless characters who do their jobs dutifully,
but without much feeling.

Ms. Maynard's intent must have been a children's version
of Tracy Kidder's ''House,'' describing, step by step,
the construction of a house next to the home of Andy, a
middle-sized boy. But, like Red, the builder, Bud, the
dog, John and Gary, the carpenters, and Dave and Steve,
the Sheetrockers, Andy is little more than a name. His
emotions, as he watches the house rise, are told, not
shown; what excitement he feels, even while constructing
his own scrap-lumber tree house, seems almost
tranquilized.

When a nail in his tree house bends instead of sinking
in, Andy feels ''like crying. 'Dumb tree,' he said.
'Hey, what kind of talk is that?' called Red. 'Everybody
makes mistakes. Let me give you a few pointers.' '' But
what, exactly, these pointers are is no more explained
than how, or if, Andy resolves his feelings of
frustration.

There are informational, as well as emotional, gaps. At
the construction site, Andy sees ''a huge skidder.''
What is a skidder? Or a joist? We vaguely gather that a
2 by 4 is lumber-related, but what precisely is it and
why is it named numerically? Unless a child has actually
seen carpentering and construction close up, the book
won't make sense to him or her. And about the ''hers'':
there are none here. This is what used to be called ''a
boy's book.'' While women on construction crews are a
rarity even in 1987, their complete absence as major
players here, with males strictly in traditional roles,
adds to the 50's period-piece flatness.

So do the illustrations by Steve Bethel, Ms. Maynard's
husband. Gentle full-color paintings, they are
nonetheless too conventional for a conventional text.
Mr. Bethel's representational style could ground a
dreamlike or experimental book beautifully; here, it
only reinforces the pervasive dullness.

The terrain, emotional and physical, on which real
houses and real little boys are built is far more rocky
and interesting, less level, than that on which ''New
House'' is constructed.

Crescent Dragonwagon is
the author of numerous books for children, including
''Half a Moon and One Whole Star,'' and the novel ''The
Year It Rained.''